When a business purchases, imports or makes and intra-EU acquisition of a car an automatic restriction on input tax recovery may apply, ie, any input tax incurred is irrecoverable regardless of whether or not the car is used by the business to make taxable supplies.

But note that Northern Ireland continues to be part of the EU single market and, therefore, Northern Irish businesses continue to be required to account for acquisition VAT when purchasing goods from EU VAT registered suppliers.